


Like a Family

by Alicin_Wonderland



Category: Juno (2007)
Genre: F/M, Mild Language
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-01
Updated: 2015-03-01
Packaged: 2018-03-15 18:48:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3457874
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alicin_Wonderland/pseuds/Alicin_Wonderland
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Twelve years after Juno gave birth and Vanessa adopted the baby, Juno and Bleeker have settled down in a charming Minnesota home and started a family. Everything is going smoothly until Juno gets a life-altering phone call from someone in her past who is now on death's door. Are the Bleekers willing to uproot their newly settled lives?</p><p>I do not own anyone or anything from the movie Juno.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Like a Family

Juno swept the kitchen of her and her husband's small, but charming, Minnesota home. The Runaways were quietly playing from her iPod doc in the kitchen table. She nodded her head back and forth as she swept. It had been twelve years since Juno had given birth to her son and was, once again, pregnant, this time with twin girls. She was due in about a month, on the 23rd of July. The front door popped open and Bleeker walked into the kitchen. He set his things on the table and frowned.  
"Honey, the doctor said you should be resting," Bleeker reminded her.  
"Yeah, but what does she know anyway? A little sweeping won't hurt," Juno replied, shrugging it off.  
"Come on, Juno, please got sit down or - " the sound of the phone ringing interrupted Bleeker's over protective rant.  
"Hold that thought." Juno didn't recognize the number but answered anyway. "Hello?"  
"Juno?"  
The voice was vaguely familiar. "Yes, may I ask who's calling?"  
"It's Vanessa."  
Juno dropped the phone and it clattered on the ground. She turned to Bleeker, wide-eyed.  
"Who is it?" Bleeker asked.  
"It's - it's Vanessa."  
Bleeker looked as stunned as Juno. "What does she want?"  
"I don't freakin' know!"  
Bleeker picked up the phone and handed it to his wife. "Here."  
"Um, hi. Hi, Vanessa. Uh, how's it going?" Juno stammered.  
"I know this must be a surprise, and I'm really sorry to spring this on you. But we need to talk. Please, Juno. It's very important."  
"Erm, okay. Okay. Sure. Yeah. When and where?"  
"How about my house tomorrow, around four?"  
"Okay. I'll see you there. Yeah."  
"Thank you."  
"Of course, um, bye." Juno hung up.  
"Well?" Bleeker stared at her.  
"She wants to talk."  
\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
It had been what felt like a lifetime since she had walked up the steps to Vanessa's house. She lightly knocked on the door and wondered if this was a mistake. Just as she was about to turn around and bolt the other direction, a woman (who was not Vanessa) opened the door.  
"Miss Juno MacGuff?" The woman asked. She was around Juno's age with strawberry blonde hair and blue eyes.  
"Mrs. Juno Bleeker," Juno corrected her. She stretched and sighed a little, carrying around two humans was making her quite sore.  
"Oh, I'm terribly sorry, let's get you a place to sit down."  
Juno waved it off as she walked through the threshold and looked around; the house still amazed her. "Where's Vanessa?" She turned to face the woman.  
"Right this way, Mrs. Bleeker."  
Juno almost laughed, it sounded so professional. "Juno's fine. I didn't catch your name though."  
"Lisa," the woman, Lisa, smiled. "I'm Vanessa's live-in nanny." She knocked on a bedroom door.  
"Come in," said a voice from inside. Lisa opened the door to reveal a very obviously sick Vanessa. Whatever medication she was on had made her bald, and she looked tired. Very, very tired. "Juno! It's so nice to see you! It's been so long."  
"It's nice to see you, too, Vanessa. Although, I wish it was under better...circumstances," Juno said sadly.  
"That what I need to talk to you about. Juno, I'm going to be blunt...I'm dying, I have two months left at the maximum. And my son - our son - needs a place to go. I was hoping between now and then you could get to know him, and you can even have the house."  
"Vanessa," Juno said in shock, she placed both hands on her very pregnant belly. "I'm about to have two babies to raise. There's nowhere else your son can go?"  
"Our son. And no, Marc moved to Hong Kong for business. There's nowhere for him to go. Please, Juno. Please."  
She looked at the dying woman in the bed. Someone that she considered her friend for a brief time. Both mothers were tearing up. What choice did she have? "I guess. Okay, Vanessa. I'll take him."  
"Thank you, so much. Lisa, will you go get him from his room?"  
"Certainly," Lisa said, and disappeared.  
"Sooo?" Vanessa said. "Boys or girls?"  
"Girls," Juno said. "If there is one thing I'm ever going to tell them not to do, it's having sex in highschool. No way."  
Vanessa managed a weak laugh. "And is that a wedding ring on your finger?"  
"It is," Juno smiled. "Bleeker and I will be married three years this September."  
"Wow."  
Juno looked at Vanessa helplessly. "What happened?"  
"About two years ago, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. I went into remission for three months and when it came back - it spread. There was nothing anyone could do."  
Juno sat down next to her friend and took her hand. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."  
The bedroom door clicked open. Lisa entered with a boy who has curly brown hair and big brown eyes, he was about as tall as Juno. "Hi, mom," he said. It wasn't meant for Juno. She saw what looked like a gazillion dollars of braces on his teeth.  
"Noah, I would like you to meet Juno, your birth mother." Vanessa looked at her son, who looked at Juno, who looked at Vanessa. They all held their breaths, waiting for some kind of reaction.  
"Hi," the kid said.  
"Hi." What am I doing? Juno thought to herself. I'm not this kid's mother!  
"Why don't you two go out to the living room to talk? I'm pretty worn out."  
Noah and Juno exited the room and sat in the living room, awkwardly looking at each other. Juno searched for a safe topic. "So...how's school?"  
Noah looked at her in disbelief. "It's summer."  
"Oh. Right."  
"Do you even know how to be a mom?" Noah scuffed the toe of his shoe against the ground without any sign of emotion in his voice.  
"Wow, kid, you don't waste any time cutting to the chase, do ya?"  
"Don't call me 'kid'."  
"The answer is, no, I don't know how to be a mom. But I'm going to figure it out and I hope to be a pretty friggin' great one. For your sake, and for their sakes," Juno said, being completely honest, as she rubbed her belly.  
"You're never going to be as good a mom as mine is," Noah snapped harshly.  
"Look, Noah, Vanessa wouldn't have decided to place you in my care unless she thought I could do it. So cut me some slack, alright?" Juno tried not to let Noah know his words stung.  
"If you could be a mom, you would've been one twelve years ago!" Noah yelled. The kid stormed out of the living room and up the stairs.  
"Noah!" Juno called. The door slammed. She pulled herself up off the sofa and waddled up the stairs. There was only one closed door.  
She knocked. "Go away!"  
"Noah, c'mon, please give me a chance. You don't understand."  
The door flew open. "What don't I understand? Do I not understand that you carried me for nine months and then gave me up the second you could? Do I not understand that you were a teenage slut? Do I not understand that you haven't cared about me and never will? You know what I don't understand? Why I never got a letter, or a phone call, or an email, or even a picture! That’s what I don't understand."  
"Noah, listen to me. I wanted you to have the best life possible - with Vanessa, who you love. I wasn't ready to take care of you at 16. And if I tried to contact you, I thought that would upset you. I didn't even know if your mom would tell you you are adopted or not. I'm sorry. But I care, I've always cared. I think about you everyday. Please don't hate me. Please."  
"I don't hate you," Noah said and a tear rolled down his cheek. He looked so much like Bleeker. "I'm just not ready for someone to replace my mom."  
"Oh, of course not." Juno gathered the boy into an awkward hug. "And I'm not trying to replace your mom. I'm going to be here when she can't be."  
"What about - what about my dad?"  
"Well, we've been married for about two and a half years and you're going to have two little sisters."  
"Really?"  
"Really."  
"I'm sorry I said those things to you," Noah apologized, looking at the floor. "I didn't mean them."  
"It's okay, Noah. I understand. Maybe tomorrow you can meet Bleeker?" He looked at Juno blankly. "Bleeker is your...father," Juno explained.  
Noah didn't bother to hide his laughter. "My father's name is 'Bleeker'?"  
Juno laughed. "Kind of. That's his last name, and my last name actually. His first name is Paulie."  
"Okay," Noah agreed. "I'll meet him."  
\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
One week later Bleeker and Juno stood on the front steps to Vanessa's house the dinner plans had been put off several times due to Vanessa's worsting condition.  
Lisa opened the door with a smile. "Mr. and Mrs. Bleeker, how lovely to see you."  
"Lisa, Juno is fine," the pregnant woman reminded her. "And just call him Bleeker." She felt a slight pain in her stomach. She had gone to the hospital in false labor yesterday and attributed it to that.  
"Alright, Juno," Lisa said, emphasizing the name.  
She walked them to the dining room where Noah and Vanessa were sitting. Vanessa had an oxygen line in her nose and looked even more pale than when Juno had seen her last. She had lost a lot of weight and the bones in her wrists were clearly visible at the end of a warm looking sweater. "Hello, Juno, Bleeker. You guys gave me a reason to drag myself out of bed," she said, smiling a bitter smile.  
"Bleeker," Juno said. "This is our son, Noah. Noah, this is Bleeker." Bleeker shifted from foot to foot, not sure what to say. He painfully resembled a deer in the headlights. Juno elbowed her husband and growled, "Say hi."  
"You looks so much like your mother," Bleeker said instead. Not quite what Juno was hoping for, but at least he said something.  
"Um, I - I guess. Yeah," Noah stammered.  
"Bleeker, sit down!" Juno hissed. They took a seat at the fancy dining room table and there was an awkward silence for a while.  
"Would you guys like anything to drink?" Vanessa asked.  
Juno held up her Slurp n Slush blue slushee. "I'm good."  
By the end of the night Noah and his biological parents had become tentative friends. It turned out that Noah plays the guitar, pretty well, too. Bleeker was proud to find out his son participated in every sport in school, including track, although soccer is his favorite and he had been doing Tae Kwon Do eight years.  
“That’s awesome, home skillet,” Juno said. There was another pang in her stomach. She frowned.  
Noah turned to Bleeker, “Did she seriously just call me ‘home skillet’?”  
“You’ll get used to it,” Bleeker told him. “Honey, what’s wrong?”  
“I - I don’t know. I’ve been having these weird pains all night.” Juno stood up, a hand on her belly.  
“Are you okay? Do you need to go to the hospital?”  
“I’m sure it’s nothing. Don’t worry abo - “ Juno’s water broke all over Vanessa’s expensive rug. “Oh, shit!”  
“Oh, god. Oh my God. It’s happening. You’re having the babies! Jesus, we don’t have our things! Juno, what should we do? Let’s get out to the van. I can’t believe this is happening!” Bleeker put one hand on Juno’s back and ushered her out to the car.  
“Is she going to be okay?!” Noah called after them.  
“She’ll be fine!” Bleeker called back.  
\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
“If the doctor does not come in here with the fucking epidural pretty soon, I am going to kill someone!” Juno yelled as she paced the hospital room. Her blue gown fluttered around her.  
“Honey, I believe we went over this five minutes ago, you aren’t far enough along,” Brenda told her stepdaughter.  
“Ahhhhhhhhiiiiiii!” Juno yelled, doubling over with her hands on her knees. “I...want...some...fucking...painkillers!” she panted. “I am about to push two humans out my vag. Get me the epidural!”  
Brenda leaned her head out the door and shouted down the hallway, “Someone get my kid her epidural!”  
“I’ll go find a doctor,” Bleeker said. Juno had a feeling he just wanted to get out of the room his screaming wife was in. She knew she was making things more difficult than they probably needed to be, but every time she had a contraction she wished she was still a virgin.  
Just then a strawberry blonde poked her head through the doorway. It was Lisa. “Hi, Juno. Vanessa asked me to run some things over here because she heard you didn’t have your hospital bag with you. There’s baby girl outfits in different sizes. I hope they fit.” She set the shiny pink bags on the table. They were from “Edelweiss Baby” (very expensive), and the pink ribbon handles shined in the fluorescent light. “Vanessa and I say congratulations. Oh, would it be alright if Noah maybe stopped by to meet his baby sisters? His mom - his other mom - thought that might make him a little happier.”  
“Oh, yeah, of course. Bring him by whenever - Ahhhhhhiiiii!” she screamed as another contraction ripped through her.  
Lisa stood there awkwardly for a second before saying, “Congratulations!” one last time and disappearing with a wave.  
“Let’s get you back into bed,” Brenda instructed. She helped her pregnant stepdaughter into bed just as Bleeker returned with the doctor.  
The doctor took a look and then administered the epidural, shortly after Juno felt much, much better. Then Juno had to start pushing, baby number one came after about ten minutes and there was a very long seven minutes before baby number two came along. “Jesus Christ,” Juno said, laying back against the hospital bed and panting. Brenda and Bleeker were each holding a baby. Juno reached for her daughters and each one was set in the crooks of her arms.  
“So, what are my grand daughters’ names?”  
“Skye Annabelle and Jasper Serenity Bleeker,” Juno said confidently. Bleeker nodded in agreement and kissed each of his daughters and his wife on the tops of their heads. He stroked her hair softly.  
“I love it,” Brenda said. Even if they are hippie names, she thought to herself.  
Juno’s father walked into the room. “Junebug! How are you? How are my granddaughters?”  
“They’re good, Dad, don’t worry.” He made a motion to hold them and Bleeker picked up Jasper and handed her to her grandfather. Then Juno handed Skye to her grandmother.  
They were so perfect, and Juno knew Bleeker thought so, too. They had Bleeker’s eyes and Juno’s smile. It was a good combination. Juno quickly fell asleep for the night rest of the night.

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Knock, knock, knock,” Lisa said from the doorway the next morning. She leaned against the frame, smiling.  
Juno looked up from Skye’s face. “Lisa, hey. Thank you so much for those clothes. I never had a chance to say anything because, ya know, contractions. Painful little - “  
“Juno! Not in front of the kids,” Bleeker said sternly.  
“I don’t think they care. But okay. Hey, did you bring Noah?”  
“He’s on a different floor visiting his mom. She has to stay in the hospital from now on. She doesn’t have much time left...”  
“I’m so sorry. I know this must be hard on you and Noah,” Juno said.  
“Don’t worry, Juno, you’re making it easier for him, even if it doesn’t seem like it. But we do need to discuss the living arrangement.”  
“Can that wait a few days? We have our hands full,” Bleeker asked.  
“Vanessa won’t be home anymore. I will stay as long as you need me, but Noah needs someone more than just a nanny and the house is being left to you and Juno,” Lisa said. “These last few years have been a nightmare, the best thing for Noah is to get a nice stable family re-established.”  
“We won’t have time to move or get the nursery set up. It just won’t work,” Bleeker insisted.  
“I can handle the moving arrangements and the nursery, with your help, if you just agree to move. I promise it will work out.”  
Bleeker looked at his wife and daughters. “Juno?”  
“Alright, yeah. Why don’t you guys get started? I’ll handle the kids, Noah included when he gets here.”  
“Are you sure?” Lisa and Bleeker asked in unison. They looked at each other awkwardly.  
“Sorry, I’ve been a nanny for seven years. It’s second nature to take care of people.”  
“Oh, I’m fine,” Juno said. “A little sore, but fine. Go figure stuff out. I might even go up to visit Vanessa.”  
“Okay, Noah will be here in a few minutes. I’ll be back to pick him up as soon as I can, I promise it won’t be more than two hours or so.”  
“Eh, it’s not a problem. I can handle the kid. Maybe he can even help me with his sisters.” Juno set Skye in the crib next to the bed and Bleeker laid her sister next to her. Juno couldn’t help feeling a slight pang of jealousy as she watched Bleeker exit the room with Lisa, who didn’t have twenty pounds of baby weight to shed. Having her as a nanny might just be a issue, Juno thought to herself, and then realized how ridiculous she was being and waved it off.  
As soon as she did, Jasper started crying. Juno sighed, knowing this would be how things are going to be for a very long time. She stood from the hospital bed and picked up the squirming baby girl and started walking around the small room, rocking her back and forth. “Shhhh, shhh. Jasper, shh. Hush.” She walked around for another few minutes and Jasper’s mouth was still open in a never-ending cry. Juno briefly panicked, worrying that she would never be able to get the baby to stop crying. She decided to start singing to her. “Hush, little baby, don’t say a word. Mama’s gonna buy you a mocking bird...” Just then Skye decided to erupt into a fit of screaming and crying. “Oh, Jesus Christ.”  
“Right this way,” she heard a nurse say outside the door and Noah entered.  
He looked at his mother and his crying sisters wide-eyed. “You know,” he said with the slightest of smirks. “You aren’t very good at that.”  
Juno looked at him in exasperation and her eyes welled up. “You think I don’t know that?!”  
Noah softened a little. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”  
Juno eyed him warily.  
Noah walked over to the crib and asked, “What’s her name?” Juno told him. “I like it. Can I hold her?”  
“Please do, they won’t quiet down.”  
Noah leaned over and picked up the baby with a surprisingly practiced hold. He even started singing to her, “Rock-a-bye baby on the tree top...” After a verse of that and the entirety of “Hush Little Baby”, Skye stopped crying and simply stared at her brother in wonder. “Hi, there,” he said.  
“Kid, how come you’re so good at that?” Juno asked as she continued to struggle with a still slightly whimpering Jasper.  
He shrugged, “Baby cousins on Marc’s side.”  
“I have to say, I think you’re handling this all pretty well, I mean, your mom and me and Bleeker.”  
“My mom has been sick for a while, I’ve had time to come to terms with it. And, in reality, the thought of you being my mom isn’t so bad, even though you call me “kid” and “home skillet”.”  
“I’ll make you a deal, I’ll keep the nicknames to a minimum if you promise to help me out with Jasper and Skye. Deal?”  
“Deal.” 

\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Vanessa passed two and a half weeks later. Noah stayed by her bedside in stony silence as she took her last breath, she smiled at him once more, and was gone. He became a quiet boy, so quiet Juno and Bleeker began to worry. He walked around the house silently, stood in the doorway of the nursery watching his twin sisters, and ate all his meals in his room with the door shut. Juno woke up early and checked on him on her way to the twin’s room, he was sleeping soundly with a photo of Vanessa clutched to his chest. She shook her head sadly and shut the door. Downstairs she heard Lisa and Bleeker talking.  
“He’s just coping,” Lisa assured him. “He needs time.”  
“How are you holding up?” Juno asked her as she finished walking down the stairs.  
“I’m - I’m okay. Vanessa has been a good friend of mine for quite some time but this was... expected.”  
“True. But if you need any time off -” Bleeker began to offer.  
“No, no, that’s fine. I’m not going to leave you guys all by yourselves with the kids. Plus, Noah’s used to having me around.”  
“Anything you need, let us know,” Juno told her.  
Bleeker leaned down and kissed his wife on the cheek, “Have a good day.” And then he was out the door and off to work as a dentist in a nearby town.  
“Lisa, I hate to ask, but will you check on the twins? I think it’s time I talk to Noah. He can’t spend the rest of his life locked in that frickin’ bedroom.” Juno shook her head. “I don’t know if I can do this.”  
Lisa reached over and put her hand on top of Juno’s. “Juno, you can do this. Like it or not, you’re his mom now, or you have to try to be. No, not to replace Vanessa, but to prove that she left her son with someone she could trust to take care of him.”  
“Why didn’t she leave Noah to you?” Juno mumbled.  
“I’m not cut out to be a mom. Sure, I can babysit, pick him up from soccer games, or make a lunch or two but I can’t be his mother.”  
Juno sighed and hardened her resolve. Noah needs me, she told herself. I have to help him. She walked up the staircase and down the long hallway, silently dreading each step. She stopped in front of his door that was covered in posters of soccer players and musicians. She knocked. No response. She tried again. Still nothing. She opened the door to find Noah softly strumming his guitar as he sat on his bed. He didn’t even look up. She realized he was playing “Pour Some Sugar On Me” by Def Leppard.  
“Hey, Noah,” she said awkwardly. “I was hoping you would come down and have some breakfast with me.”  
“Not hungry.”  
“Are you sure? You didn’t eat your dinner last night.”  
“I’m sure.”  
“Look, Noah, I know you just lost your mom. I know how it feels, my mom left me and my dad when I was a lot younger than you, I haven’t seen her since, she just send me a cactus every Valentine’s Day. I get how much it hurts -”  
“No you don’t!” he yelled, pushing his guitar aside. “Your mom can come back! My mom is gone, really gone! She’s dead. You don’t know what it feels like!”  
“Noah, calm down, please. You’re going to wake up Sk -”  
“I don’t care!” Noah screamed. He jumped up from the bed and shoved everything off his desk on to the floor. Seconds after the crash Lisa came flying into the room with the crying twins in her arms. “I don’t care about any of you! I just want my mother back! I want her back! I want her...” Noah trailed off into sobs. Juno gathered Noah into a hug and just held him. She didn’t even know how long they stood there, but it was a very long time.  
\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
“Noah, you can talk to me, okay?”  
“I know I can, it’s just really hard.”  
“I understand, but please, you have to start talking to us. It’s not healthy to stay locked in your room all the time. I want us to try to be a family and I think it would be good for you.”  
“I want that, too, Juno,” Noah said through sniffles. “I really do.”  
“Let’s go downstairs and have some breakfast and talk things out for a while, okay?”  
“Like a family?”  
“Like a family.”  
Juno took her son’s hand and led him downstairs.  
This might just work out, she thought to herself.


End file.
